LAST ROYAL GOVERNOR OF MASSACHUSETTS II 



graved the arms of the Hutchinsons of Lincolnshire. 

 Thus in daily going out and in at the door, as in the 

 vague wonder of the grandsire's stately funeral, may 

 the thoughtful and impressible child, in somewhat the 

 mood of a generous little prince, have come to feel 

 himself identified with the civic life of Boston. Of 

 adulation for such boys there is usually enough and to 

 spare; but Thomas Hutchinson was not of the sort 

 that is easily spoiled. In the writings of his later 

 years, amid all the storm and stress of a troubled life, 

 nothing is more conspicuous than the absence of per- 

 sonal vanity and the sweetness of temper with which 

 events are judged aside from their bearings upon 

 himself. 



In the simple school life of those days there were 

 not so many subjects to be half learned as now, and 

 boys became freshmen at a very tender age. Hutch- 

 inson was barely sixteen when he received his bach- 

 elor's degree at Harvard, and in after years he frankly 

 confessed that he could not clearly see what he had 

 done to earn it. At first the ledger interested him 

 more than the lexicon. He carried on a little foreign 

 trade by sending ventures in his father's ships, and 

 thus earned enough money to have defrayed the whole 

 cost of his education, while at the same time he became 

 an expert in bookkeeping. In those days Harvard 

 students were graded according to social position. 

 Early in the freshman year a list of names was hung 

 in the college buttery, and those at the top were al- 

 lowed the best rooms and other privileges. Usually 

 this list remained without change, and it is in this 

 order that the names appear on the triennial catalogue 

 until 1773, when the democratic alphabet took its 



